amber heard charity donation

Amber Heard admits to not paying $3.5million divorce settlement she pledged to charity

In court yesterday she said: ‘I fully intend to honour all of my pledges’


Amber Heard has admitted to not making the $3.5million charity donation she promised to pledge following her divorce settlement from Johnny Depp.

Speaking in court yesterday as part of her defamation trial with ex-husband Johnny Depp, Heard said she had been unable to give the money to charity because Depp had kept suing her.

She said: “I fully intend to honor all of my pledges. I would love for him to stop suing me so I can.”

Amber Heard and Johnny Depp are currently taking part in a defamation trial in Virginia. Depp initially sued his ex-wife Heard for defamation for $50million following an article she wrote for the Washington Post in 2018 where she said she was a “public figure representing domestic abuse”. Heard did not mention Depp by name but he claimed the article caused him to lose acting roles. Heard then counter-sued Depp for $100million.

Following their divorce in 2017, Heard appeared on a Dutch talk show where she pledged to split her entire $7million divorce settlement and donate it to the ACLU and the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles.

On the show she said: “$7million in total was donated – I split it between the ACLU and the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles. I wanted nothing.”

ACLU is a nonprofit organisation founded in 1920 which works to defend the liberties and individual rights of Americans.

Since then Heard has claimed multiple times, including under oath during Depp’s libel case in 2020 against The Sun, that she had pledged the money.

Earlier in the Depp and Heard trial, Terence Dougherty, the COO of ACLU, testified only $1.3million had been donated by Heard or on her behalf.

He said in December 2018 Heard donated $350,000 directly. Depp donated $100,000, investment company Fidelity donated $350,000 and $500,000 was donated from an account at investment firm Vanguard, which Dougherty said he believed was from Elon Musk.

During the trial Heard’s lawyer asked Amber why she had accepted the $7million divorce settlement in 2017.

Heard said she didn’t want any money from Depp but was told if she didn’t accept money she wouldn’t be able to settle.

She said: “I didn’t care about the money. I was told if I didn’t agree to a number it could be overturned, we would never settle. I took far less than what they were offering and what I was entitled to.

“I just wanted my safety and my future and he compromised that….I wanted him to leave me alone. I’ve been saying that since 2016.”

Featured image credit via Steve Helber/POOL/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock

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